


Hauntings

by 55vre55



Category: National Theatre, Treasure Island - Lavery, Treasure Island - Robert Louis Stevenson
Genre: Based off the National Theatre production, Emotionally Repressed Pirates, F/M, Female Jim Hawkins, Hurt/Comfort, National Theatre - Freeform, Nightmares, Pirates, Sickfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-01
Updated: 2020-05-01
Packaged: 2021-03-01 20:14:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,282
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23942914
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/55vre55/pseuds/55vre55
Summary: Two months into their voyage, and Jim is on top of the world.So she immediately feels that something must be wrong this morning when she wakes.
Relationships: Jim Hawkins & John Silver, Jim Hawkins/John Silver, Jim Hawkins/Long John Silver
Comments: 6
Kudos: 27





	Hauntings

**Author's Note:**

> Did someone say hyperfixation?
> 
> Based on the 2015 National Theatre production of Treasure Island with Arthur Darvill and Patsy Ferran, recently broadcast online as part of their National Theatre At Home series.
> 
> I have no idea about the day-to-day life of a ship's cook, so please don't come after me about historical accuracy. All other constructive criticism welcome!
> 
> Special thanks to balmoras on tumblr for the beta read!

Silver’s always up and moving before she wakes up, ready with a crust of bread and some cheese for her to scarf down. Sometimes, one of Doctor Livesey’s horrid apples, and he laughs when she wrinkles her nose at them. She’s never seen him go to bed before her, either – always one last thing to do when he sends her off to her bunk. Sometimes, she wonders if he sleeps at all, or if his love of the sea simply sustains him, unending.

(The Doctor had tried to insist, at first, that Jim share her room. Propriety, and all that. After the fourth time Jim was forced to stay awake all night, listening to her retch, Jim had put her foot down and insisted she would kip in the small room off the galley with Silver. Livesey had finally relented, but not before subjecting Jim to the most embarrassing conversation of her life. As if she’d ever do any such things with _him_.)

(At least, not outside her most secret of dreams.)

Jim’s gotten used to her new routine, helping Silver cook and clean, spending her days talking and laughing with him. He’s funny, and she’s not sure why she finds that surprising. Perhaps it’s just the lingering after-image of her nightmare one-legged man. More and more, she’s convinced that Long John cannot possibly be the pirate Billy Bones ranted about. There must be millions of one-legged men in the world; he cannot be the same. He’s too full of life to be such a specter.

Two months into their voyage, and Jim is on top of the world.

So she immediately feels that something must be wrong this morning when she wakes. The galley is dark, candles long burnt down and extinguished, the fire reduced to just embers. The creaking of the ship and the distant cries of birds are the only sounds she hears. Nothing like the usual whistle or laugh or jest from her cabinmate that usually wakes her.

It’s so strange, for a moment she wonders if she might still be dreaming.

Sitting up, she pulls on her shoes (the Doctor’s second-best shoes, better than anything she’s ever owned) and steps quietly to the door into the galley. There really is no one there.

A low moan behind her makes her start and whip around to look at Silver’s bunk. A hunched form is curled up under the blanket, back to her and the rest of the room.

Is he ill? Her feet take a careful step towards him when he groans again, not sure what she should do. Her eyes catch something lying on the deck between their beds.

His leg.

She looks again at his back. She’s never seen him without the wooden leg, had almost managed to forget about it completely. She never realized he ever took it off.

Silver groans again and shifts slightly, his blanket slipping down off his shoulders. Jim steps forward, lightly, intent on pulling it back up. She knows enough now about how to feed the rest of the crew; if he is sick, she can let him be.

(He’d let her be, after all, when homesickness and exhaustion had overwhelmed her a month into their voyage. He’d even managed to cook something that tasted enough like Grandma’s porridge to cheer her spirits. She still doesn’t know how he knew what to make.)

Her fingers have just barely grasped the edge of his thin blanket when he starts, eyes flying open. They’re not his usual sharp gaze, however—they’re glazed over, distant, as if he’s not really there.

“Wha—” His voice is a low rasp. He jerks away from her touch and then promptly groans in pain, hunching over his leg. Between the shadows and blanket, she can barely tell that there’s nothing below his knee.

But still, she can tell.

A flurry of wings behind her makes her jump as Flint lands on her bed. “Pieces of eight,” the mad parrot screeches, “pieces of eight. Hop to it, hop to it lads.”

“Get out,” Silver groans, clutching his leg with his eyes squeezed shut in pain.

The parrot merely squawks again, somehow almost sounding like a laugh.

“Blasted—thing!” Silver shouts now. He scrabbles for a moment on the table between their bunks before grasping one of their candle holders. He throws it at Flint with a roar of “I said, get out! Damned bird!”

Jim finds herself pressed against the wall, staring at Silver with wide eyes even as the parrot flees the room with a cackle. She’s never heard him yell before, never heard his voice raised with anything other than a laugh or an excited beckon.

(His voice had been so low, so quiet, that night when he’d claimed her from the storm. And yet, the sea had obeyed it.)

Silver’s eyes, still hazy with pain and anger, nevertheless manage to find her where she is frozen. “Staring, lad?” he sneers, mouth twisted into something ugly. “Do I scare you?”

When she doesn’t reply, still watching him, his hand slams down on the small table. It makes her jump.

“Useless!” he shouts this time. “All of you! Can’t even take care of Flint!” His eyes are wild, staring through her. “Out! Get out!” Another candle holder comes her way, and she quickly ducks out of the room, heart pounding.

He had asked her about ghosts, once. She’s clearly not the only one having nightmares.

Jim stares at the empty, cold galley, wondering what to do. For a moment, she considers going to fetch Doctor Livesey. But it’s unlikely the woman is awake yet, and Silver hasn’t made any effort to conceal his disdain for how much of a landlubber she is. He’d likely be even more upset if Jim brought the Doctor down here to see him like this.

He’d been clutching his leg in pain.

She knows a bit about pain.

She knows about how much Grandma has been complaining, these last few years, about joints that ache in the cold and the damp and any time she has to climb all the way up to Jim’s attic room in their inn. She’s tasted the tincture that the Doctor gave Grandma to help ease her aches, and long since memorized the recipe so she could make it on her own when Grandma was busy. She thinks she has most of the ingredients, here in their little galley. It might not be enough for him, but—

It’s short work, finding a saucepan and gathering what of the ingredients she can find. Surprisingly, there’s only one missing, and she crosses her fingers that it will still work without. Working quickly, she sets it to boil, ears pricked all the while for any more noises that might come from their bunk. Thankfully, that horrid parrot has flown off somewhere else on the ship. She hopes it doesn’t come back until Silver is in his right mind again.

She spends her time waiting for the tincture to cook by starting on the day’s meals. Rations set out for the crew to collect in a spare moment for lunch, and the evening’s stew starting to cook over the low fire. It feels good, having something to do with her hands. Eventually, though, the mixture is ready, and she hesitates about what to do next.

First—a spare blanket, fetched from the ship’s stores. Grandma’s pain is always worst when she’s cold. This, plus his own and hers as well, should help.

Second—the tincture, poured carefully into a cup and tasted. It seems the same as what she makes at home. She hopes she’s remembered it correctly.

Third—an apple and some cheese, carefully sliced onto a platter. She doesn’t know if he’ll be hungry, but best to have it just in case.

When Jim steps back into their cabin, Silver is lying on his back. She’d think he was sleeping, long hair spread out on his pillow, were it not for the grimace marring his usually friendly face.

Quietly, ever so quietly, she sets down her offerings and then spreads the extra blankets over him. She is careful to step over his discarded leg as she does so, afraid of disturbing it. It seems wrong, to touch it, or even look at it too closely.

Silver groans in pain as she rearranges the blankets and his eyes blearily blink open. They’re still hazy, unfocused, but at least this time he seems to know her by the way he croaks, “Girl?”

“Stay still.” She fetches the cup and holds it to his lips. “This should help.” He obediently drinks, seemingly too disoriented to do anything else. He sighs heavily and his eyes close again. She waits to see if he might say anything else, but his breathing slowly evens out and he seems to fall asleep.

(It feels wrong, watching him sleep. For a man who is usually always moving around her, making her feel dizzy for reasons other than just the swaying of the ship, this is far too still. She remembers what he told her about sharks, the first day they saw one off the bow. Will he too perish if he stops moving?)

Her afternoon is spent peeling what seems like a never-ending pile of potatoes and then finishing the stew for the rest of the crew to eat. No one seems to notice Silver’s absence, or at least, no one comments on it, but that does little to ease the knot in her chest. She herself merely picks at her food, for once in her life not feeling very hungry.

After, she busies herself still more with scrubbing what feels like every pot and dish in the galley, until her fingers are pruned and her eyes drooping, straining in the evening candlelight.

The next thing she knows, she’s jolted awake by—something.

It’s dark, the black of night looming outside the galley’s little porthole. Jim finds herself slumped over at the table, with the last pot she’d been drying still clutched in her lap. She shifts, yawning, starting to stretch, and something slides off her back.

Long John’s coat crumples to the floor behind her.

Jim stares at it for a moment before looking at the dark doorway to their cabin. No sounds come from it, no shifting or rustling or even snores. She has no idea how long ago he might have emerged, but she can’t imagine anyone else on the ship covering her up in such a way.

Stifling another yawn, she goes to put the clean pot away and then bends to pick up his coat. It’s soft, well-worn, and she can’t help but lift it to her nose for a moment. Spices and leather, stronger than the slight whiffs she’s caught previously on occasion when he’s had to lean past her to get something out of a cupboard in the tight galley quarters.

(She feels warm, top to toe, and knows she would never dare something like this in the light of day. Grandma would certainly not approve. She wonders what Grandma would think of her, in this moment.)

Already she can feel her eyes starting to droop once more, being lulled back to sleep by the gentle swelling of the ship. She creeps into their bunk, straining her eyes until she sees the prone figure on the other bed. He seems to be sleeping again, which she is grateful for.

Jim slips off her shoes, unsure what to do with the coat in her hands. He usually keeps it hung in the galley, but the temptation to hold onto it, just for tonight, is strong.

(Too strong.)

She crawls onto her bed and carefully arranges the coat over her legs. She appreciates the warm weight, and if he didn’t mean for her to use it, he can take it back in the morning. It only takes moments for her to fall asleep once again.

(She can’t make sense of her dreams that night. Something chases her, and she runs, but at the same time part of her wants to be caught. Her stomach is tight with an unknown feeling when she wakes.)

Light is streaming through the porthole when she next opens her eyes, accompanied by a sound she never thought she’d be so glad to hear.

Silver is whistling, out in the kitchen.

Jim is surprised by the wave of relief that washes over her. Whatever had gone wrong yesterday seems to have passed.

(She hopes it never shows its face again.)

Silver has breakfast waiting for her on the table, just as always, and he almost seems as if he’s dancing around the galley, doing four things at once while whistling all the time. Jim watches him as she eats, trying to spot any sign of weariness or pain, but he looks perfectly normal once more.

He finally pauses in his work long enough to clap her on the shoulder. “Up and at ‘em, girl. Lots to do today!”

Jim swallows her last bite of bread. “Long John, what—” she starts to ask, but he waves her question off.

“Just a nightmare. Best not to ask.”

“But—”

“‘S not important, Jim. Now go and fetch some more turnips, there’s a girl.” Jim frowns, frustrated, but rises to do as she’s told. She’s stopped at the galley door when he calls out to her again.

“Jim!”

She turns back to look.

“Shall I show you some magic, tonight? After dark, once everyone else is asleep.”

He’s smiling at her.

“Yes, alright.”

(She tries to ignore how warm his smile makes her feel. Perhaps, one day soon, she might tell him.)


End file.
